Iraq

It will include a 24-hour, seven-day-a-week communications desk to get out the Pentagon's message.

Bringing campaign-style tactics to the selling of this war is nothing new for the Bush administration.

But this approach is what got the United States into the invasion and occupation of Iraq without a realistic plan, with too few troops and without adequate armor to protect the lives of American military personnel.

"Mission Accomplished" was declared by President Bush in May 2003, weeks after the invasion. But this nation is still bogged down in Iraq and at the mercy of Iraqi politicians more interested in maneuvering for power than in taking responsibility for their nation.

The reports due next month will be from Gen. David Petraeus, the top U.S. commander in Iraq, U.S. Ambassador Ryan Crocker and Joint Chiefs Chairman Gen. Peter Pace.

In addition, retired Gen. James Jones will produce an evaluation of Iraqi security forces. And the Government Accountability Office, the investigative arm of Congress, will provide an assessment of whether the Iraqi government has met security and political benchmarks set by Congress.

Some of the answers are already known. The so-called "surge," the president's decision to increase the number of U.S. troops in Iraq and escalate military operations, has had some positive impact -- where the troops are assigned.

But the insurgency tends to pick its targets, moving where the American military is not in surge mode and continuing to target American troops.

In addition, the American military has seen significant gains by making side deals with Sunni militias that had been working with those attacking Americans. This has angered the Shiite majority that controls the government and tolerates, even encourages, the civil war between Sunnis and Shiites.

A new National Intelligence Estimate released this week forecasts continued, even worsening, problems for the Iraqi government. The Iraqi parliament is on vacation this month. Even when it's not on vacation, it does nothing but argue.

U.S. Sen. John Warner, a Virginia Republican, was Navy secretary during the Vietnam War and formerly served as chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee. He upset the White House this week by calling for a withdrawal of some U.S. troops by the end of the year.

Warner says this would force the Iraqi government to change its ways, to wake up, to recognize the need to act like a government.

That's more sensible than the president's attempt to rewrite history, to compare Iraq to the Vietnam War or World War II.

The president has made it clear he will leave it to the next president to find a solution to the mess in Iraq. That is unacceptable. Congress must step forward and insist on a better plan.